In an article containing great ways to make your kid feel special on his birthday, The House of Hendrix highlights this idea from the (no longer online) Sidetracked Mom. Basically you strap a ton of balloons to your child’s closed bedroom door with crepe paper. When they wake up and open the door, they’re showered with balloons! FUN!

I considered doing this for my son’s 13th birthday today, but luckily (before I hyperventilated blowing up 500 balloons) I remembered that his room is in the basement now. A surprise balloon avalanche at the top of the basement stairs is less, “WHEEE, fun!” and more like, “WHEEE-DOO WHEEE-DOO WHEEE-DOO – oh good I hear the ambulance coming.”

But even if you don’t accidentally send your kids pinwheeling backwards down the basement steps in the face of a birthday balloon onslaught, other things can go wrong as Instagrammer @hannalee_23 so perfectly illustrates.